HARARE - The National Aids Council (NAC) is set to lobby for the introduction of a statute that compels all pregnant women in the country to undergo an HIV and Aids test in an effort to reduce mother-to-child transmission to two per cent in the next 25 years. Addressing media here recently, NAC research and documentation coordinator Freeman Dube said the initiative was meant to reduce the increase of babies being infected during pregnancy.
We are planning to lobby for the introduction of a piece of legislature that makes it mandatory for all pregnant women to undergo an HIV test. This has been devised as a possibility factor that can reduce the prevalence infection rate of mother to child transmission to two per cent in the next 25 years, said Dube.
Meanwhile, the prevention of mother to child transmission (PMTCT) programme is believed to have 62 per cent of pregnant women who are diagnosed positive on antiretroviral therapy.
Post published in: News